Wigan Athletic and the Hong Kong-based mystery: finger-pointing, the Philippines and EFL failings
- Questions abound for English Football League as Hong Kong-owned club goes into administration weeks after takeover
- Winners of 2013 FA Cup face a 12-point deduction as they battle Championship relegation amid financial crisis
English Championship club Wigan Athletic drew 0-0 against the division’s bottom side Barnsley on Saturday. The point leaves them 15th in the table, nine points above relegation but they face a 12-point deduction from the league for going into administration, which has already been appealed.
The players have only been paid 20 per cent of their wages, while 75 of the club’s staff have been laid off.
That the club, which was placed in administration by its Hong Kong-based owner Next Leader Fund (NLF) on July 1 just weeks after being taken over, could even travel to their away game was down to supporters crowdfunding more than £150,000 (HK$1.47 million).
It is understandable if off-pitch concerns now dominate at the DW Stadium, where times are so hard that the raised money has been welcomed “even down to putting petrol in the lawnmowers to get the pitches mowed”, joint administrator Paul Stanley of business recovery specialist Begbies Traynor told Wigan Today.
The eponymous DW is Dave Whelan, the Latics chairman who took them from the third division to become English Premier League stalwarts and 2013 FA Cup winners during his two decades at the club. His tenure ended in 2018 when he sold the club to Hong Kong-based International Entertainment Corporation (IEC), which is where this trail of administration begins.
Fronted by Stanley Choi Chiu-fai, a businessman and high-stakes poker player who notably won the HK$50 million first prize at the first Macau High Stakes Challenge in 2012, IEC was founded in 1998 by the late tycoon Cheng Yu-tung of Chow Tai Fook and New World Development.